Currently, the alert from a tone only pager indicates that a user is to dial a single telephone number. The user must remember this telephone number and the telephone number cannot be changed. In order to call different or variable telephone numbers a user must purchase a display pager, which is more expensive than a tone only pager. With a display pager, a received telephone number is shown on the display of the pager and the user then reads and manually dials the telephone number.
Display pagers with DTMF dialing abilities have been described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,490,579 to Godoshian, but such display pagers are complicated and expensive. Further, the phone number to be called can only be transmitted by the paging terminal to the pager, which then displays the telephone number to be called. The user must then select from the display, the telephone number to be dialed. Thus, additional transmission time is required to transmit the complete telephone number and a display is required in order for the user to read the telephone number. When considering that a typical pager user only dials a few predetermined telephone numbers, both the process of communicating telephone numbers and the pager which dials the telephone numbers may be greatly simplified.
Additionally, display pagers present a distinct disadvantage to the pager user with impaired vision. Dialing a telephone number displayed by a pager is virtually impossible for an unsighted person. Thus it is desirable to provide a pager which receives paging messages and dials corresponding telephone numbers without the necessity of a display.